Day 3 – Wed Aug 6

Update on previous notes; Please feel free to reply if you wish as I now have internet access direct in my room which is free.

Had to be a frustrated tourist today as Heather had her last major training day and was thus at the course at Shunyi all day, and I still cannot get access.

After sleeping late, decided to go to Tian’anmen square (well you have to don’t you!). The metro is really easy to use, very clean, but also pretty crowded. My regular journeys to London mean that I don’t really notice the difference.

In one sense, the square is a bit of a disappointment. It was really busy and felt very like my regular walks past the front of Buckingham Palace. Lots of tourists, a very big open space and some very big buildings. As with many places I have visited though, what makes it special is what happened there. You cannot walk around the square without thinking about the pictures of the students and the guy standing in front of the tank.

I didn’t go in to the forbidden city, but instead decided to walk South as I had read that some bits of the old Beijing still existed here. As ever, at 6’8″ tall, I am a bit of a walking tourist attraction. As one of the recipients of this diary would say…in the land of the blind the one eyed man is shot…well here in the land of the short, the tall man is photographed. By the time I had reached the south side of the square, I will probably have appeared in as many pictures as Chairman Mao! I was also interviewed by a Hong Kong radio reporter.

Wandered South in to what is called the Hutong…the old original dwelling places of local Beijingers. They remain cheek by jowl with new high rise apartment blocks and are well worth the effort of visiting. Walked off the beaten track for a couple of hours before finally returning to the main tourist areas and the shops in Wangfujing Dajie. Had lunch in McDonalds…sorry.

I will try to post some photographs somewhere on my return.

Met up with Heather late in the day. We have more problems.

Before departing for Beijing, we discovered that Heather’s kit, along with many of the other paddlers, was not eligible to be used at the Olympics due to the logo’s being too big. We were only informed of this a couple of weeks ago. We ordered some special kit to be made; sent the logo guidelines to the manufacturer and I duly picked them up and brought them out here. It was checked yesterday and has been ruled ineligible. The logo on the sleeves is the US Governing Body logo, not the US team logo, thus is not allowed. Some people are worse off than us, having got the logo on their spray decks (the bit that goes over the hole in the boat where the athlete sits) which means it is almost impossible to cover. Heather was a bit distressed, but we are so used to dealing with problems that she is beginning to get more relaxed about it. Solutions seem to be:

Get some Iron on badges from the United States Olympic people and put them on some other kit, as they are not big enough to cover the badge on the new kit.

Sew some arms over the arms of the new kit so as to cover the badge.

Some of you may be thinking that this is ridiculous so close to the Games, but this is how much of sport works. I guess the communication flow in some companies is equally poor, but it does frustrate me as no-one in sport is ever really held accountable.

We will no doubt solve things.

Our other “major” crisis is the search for a bottle of nail varnish remover. WOMEN I hear you say…well in truth it isn’t vanity…we need a big bottle so as to get stickers off the boat. We went to the hairdressers in the village but they didn’t really get it…wanting to do Heather’s nails rather than give us product for boat cleaning!

Heather also did an interview with NBC. A good friend of ours (an ex paddler Olympic medallist) is the main commentator for them. We decided that Heather will do no interviews or media once the races start i.e. no “end of run” breathless interviews between runs or after the first day. We have discovered that this may be a bit of a problem though. As athletes leave the water (similarly for other events) they are ushered through a “mixed zone” (a place where the press and athletes are both allowed). This is so that the press can get access to athletes as quickly as possible after their events. No problem with this except as normally if you do not want to talk to the press you can walk straight through and back in to an athlete only area. Turns out here though, that they are going to do “after run” boat measuring and weighing (boats are weighed and measured to ensure compliance before the race starts and then at the end of each run) in the mixed zone, thus meaning that the athlete has to be there for a couple of minutes. This will make it very difficult for the athletes as the press will be firing questions at you and you won’t have anywhere to go. We will have to consider how we deal with this and I am going to discuss with the team management, as we really don’t want to talk and need protecting in the mixed zone. This is the sort of thing that I normally take care of on race day, but once again a lack of accreditation will prevent me from doing so.

Heather moves out of the village tomorrow morning and up to the hotel at Shunyi. She comes back almost immediately for the opening ceremony and stays in the village overnight, before returning to the hotel at Shunyi on the 9th. I also move up to the hotel in Shunyi on the 9th.

Heather has two rest days now. Tomorrow she has to move her bags up to Shunyi. She will then return and we will try to have a day and a half of relaxation and distraction from the Olympics. The pressure will start to grow once at Shunyi, especially after demo runs on the 10th and then the first two events on the 11th and 12th, where we will watch so as to learn the course, before Heather starts on the 13th. In one way, daft as it sounds, all the little problems are actually quite good as they act as a distraction meaning that Heather is not worrying about the race. My main job for the next two days is to ensure we have a little fun. This will act as a further distraction and, from past experience, will relax Heather and get her in a really good mental state prior to the race days.

Final entry for today. I have BBC news in my room. The coverage does seem a bit biased. I watched the stuff on the guys that climbed the pole and unfurled the free Tibet banner and also the coverage of the torch relay. In addition the Hong Kong radio guy who interviewed me immediately wanted to talk about negative things like the weather. (today really bad looking skies…very misty). It doesn’t “feel” like that to me. The Chinese people do seem a little polite, possibly subservient, but things don’t feel bad. I visited Moscow before the Iron curtain came down and that really felt oppressive and dangerous. Beijing is nothing like that. There are a few more uniforms on the street than I am used to, but they are mostly young and helpful…no I do not believe I am niave…yes it feels likes most other big cities I have ever visited.

If Beijing is anything to go by, China is displaying every sign of capitalism in full flow. Watching the people on the metro endlessly on their mobile phones, the high rise buildings, the banks and brand names etc. These are not a people that you are going to keep control over forever. A thirst for capitalist goods and lifestyle has been unleashed. It won’t be long before this turns to a desire for a say in how things are run. I heard today that Bush has made a speech saying that the Chinese authorities should trust their people. I think that is probably right and I think I probably do.
Kind Regards
Geoff Parsons